[IP] Gates, Monsanto, others investing $30-mil in "doomsday seed bank"

[Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>]

-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Warren [mailto:jwarren@well.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, December 05, 2007 4:56 PM
To: Dave Farber
Subject: Gates, Monsanto, others investing $30-mil in "doomsday seed bank"

How benevolent of them.  (Or do they know something we don't know?)  --jim

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7529

when Bill Gates decides through the Gates Foundation to invest some $30
million of their hard earned money in a project, it is worth looking at.

No project is more interesting at the moment than a curious project in one
of the world's most remote spots, Svalbard. Bill Gates is investing millions
in a seed bank on the Barents Sea near the Arctic Ocean, some 1,100
kilometers from the North Pole. Svalbard is a barren piece of rock claimed
by Norway and ceded in 1925 by international treaty.

On this God-forsaken island Bill Gates is investing tens of his millions
along with the Rockefeller Foundation, Monsanto Corporation, Syngenta
Foundation and the Government of Norway, among others, in what is called the
'doomsday seed bank.' Officially the project is named the Svalbard Global
Seed Vault on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen, part of the Svalbard
island group.

The seed bank is being built inside a mountain on Spitsbergen Island near
the small village of Longyearbyen. It's almost ready for 'business'
according to their releases. The bank will have dual blast-proof doors with
motion sensors, two airlocks, and walls of steel-reinforced concrete one
meter thick. It will contain up to three million different varieties of
seeds from the entire world, 'so that crop diversity can be conserved for
the future,' according to the Norwegian government. Seeds will be specially
wrapped to exclude moisture. There will be no full-time staff, but the
vault's relative inaccessibility will facilitate monitoring any possible
human activity.

Did we miss something here? Their press release stated, 'so that crop
diversity can be conserved for the future.' What future do the seed bank's
sponsors foresee, that would threaten the global availability of current
seeds, almost all of which are already well protected in designated seed
banks around the world?

Anytime Bill Gates, the Rockefeller Foundation, Monsanto and Syngenta get
together on a common project, it's worth digging a bit deeper behind the
rocks on Spitsbergen. When we do we find some fascinating things.

The first notable point is who is sponsoring the doomsday seed vault. Here
joining the Norwegians are, as noted, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation;
the US agribusiness giant DuPont/Pioneer Hi-Bred, one of the world's largest
owners of patented genetically-modified (GMO) plant seeds and related
agrichemicals; Syngenta, the Swiss-based major GMO seed and agrichemicals
company through its Syngenta Foundation; the Rockefeller Foundation, the
private group who created the "gene revolution with over $100 million of
seed money since the 1970's; CGIAR, the global network created by the
Rockefeller Foundation to promote its ideal of genetic purity through
agriculture change.


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